University of Missouri faculty, students try to block media from covering protests

Students form a perimeter around the #ConcernedStudent1950 tent village and ask media to leave in November. Freelance photographer Tim Tai was firm in stating his First Amendment rights. Communications faculty member Melissa Click asks for 'muscle

By

Up Next

Students form a perimeter around the #ConcernedStudent1950 tent village and ask media to leave in November. Freelance photographer Tim Tai was firm in stating his First Amendment rights. Communications faculty member Melissa Click asks for 'muscle

Fired MU professor Melissa Click hired at Gonzaga University

Former University of Missouri professor Melissa Click has a new job at Gonzaga University in Spokane, Wash., according to the university’s website.

Click was a communications professor at the University of Missouri until she was fired in February after she was filmed calling for “some muscle” to eject a student videographer from protests at the Concerned Student 1950 camp on the Columbia campus.

At Gonzaga, Click is listed as a lecturer on the faculty page of the university’s website..

Elisabeth Mermann-Jozwiak, dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at Gonzaga, said in a written statement that Gonzaga officials knew of Click’s recent history and were confident in welcoming her to the university. Click was hired for a one-year, non-tenure track position as a lecturer in the university’s communication studies department.

“Dr. Click was hired through an extensive national search process that revealed her to be the most qualified and experienced candidate for the position,” the statement read in part. “Dr. Click has excellent recommendations for both her teaching and scholarship, which includes an extensive record of publication. We are confident she has learned much from her experiences at the University of Missouri and believe she will uphold the rigorous standards of academic excellence demanded of Gonzaga faculty and students.”

At Columbia, Click found herself at the center of controversy that continued to generate fallout for the university for months.

State lawmakers threatened massive funding cuts before settling on a $3.8 million decrease for the university system, and at the Columbia campus, enrollment is projected to plummet and hiring was frozen.

In August, the university’s top academic office said it has changed how it handles complaints about faculty behavior after administrators received a deluge of angry emails and phone calls about the former professor’s actions during the November protests.

The curators eventually fired Click without affording her the series of hearings detailed in the university’s Collected Rules and Regulations, which describes how faculty irresponsibility charges are handled.

A report released by the American Association of University Professors found that the board of curators erred by not giving Click due process. Click has said that she would weigh her legal options but has not yet filed a wrongful termination lawsuit.